How to integrate cultural and geological heritage? The case of the Comuniterrae project (Sesia Val Grande UNESCO Global Geopark, northern Italy)

Geoheritage is recognized as a component of the cultural heritage, especially in areas like UNESCO Global Geoparks. In Sesia Val Grande Geopark (northern Italy), “Comuniterrae project” participated project focusing on elaboration Community Maps Middle Lands and including 10 municipalities located “mid” territory between valley bottom highlands. Local communities have inventoried 270 elements, both immaterial material, components their heritage. These sites show strong link with geological geomorphological background. We aimed at enlightening this by selecting most iconic geo-cultural sites. An original procedure classification based 3 main criteria was set 70 selected sites: i) kind geofeatures; ii) spatial relation geofeatures sites, reciprocal conditioning; iii) humans geofeatures. The results highlight that heritage stones natural landforms, if conditioning site location, are recurrent categories. use common relation. invite to organize meetings local populations discuss these outcomes, enrich touristic offer multidisciplinary approaches.